Introduction:
A. Many years ago a major American magazine published the results of a most fascinating survey.
1. The editors had asked 16 prominent Americans what they did in order to find peace of mind in the midst of our stressful world. The responses were quite revealing.
2. Noted author James Michener reported that he found peace of mind by walking his two dogs along deserted country roads, old streams, and fields that had not been plowed for half a century.
3. Barry Goldwater, for many years the senior senator from Arizona, said that he found peace of mind in his hobbies—boating, photography and flying. He especially found peace of mind by taking reflective walks in the Grand Canyon.
4. Walter Cronkite, the former CBS anchorman, said he preferred solitude, usually by “going to sea in a small boat.”
5. Sammy Davis, Jr., listed looking for the best in others as a way to find peace of mind.
6. And Bill Moyers, the celebrated producer of so many PBS documentaries, has found peace of mind by attending family reunions, preferably those held in out-of-the-way places. (cf. James Montgomery Boice, Romans, II, pp. 503-510)
B. When you consider these responses, several observations come to mind:
1. All the responses are essentially subjective and dependent on outward circumstances.
2. They reflect a desire for an ideal world, a quiet place to think, a place to be alone, or with people you can trust.
3. Who among us cannot identify with those longings?
4. In this hustle-bustle world where we live in a continual pressure cooker, we all would like to find that “old stream” or that “little boat” or those forgotten towns where we can stroll down the street unnoticed.
5. The responses show that there is a universal desire for peace of mind.
C. Interestingly, none of the answers relates peace of mind to worldly goals like money, fame, success or power.
1. And yet those are often the things that are the most sought after things in life.
2. People often spend their lives seeking money, sex and power – hoping they find satisfaction.
3. But money rarely brings satisfaction.
a. Ask a man with money if his money makes him happy; the answer invariably will be no.
3. The same is true for power—“the ultimate aphrodisiac.”
a. Many who have some power just want more – move up the ladder, seek higher office.
b. Are they satisfied? No. They usually have their sights on the top position
4. And what about sex? Will that satisfy?
a. Ask the broken victims of this generation about sex—lonely women, frustrated men, aimlessly coupling and uncoupling, searching through the night for what? Another thrill?
b. We have unlimited sexual freedom, but we don’t have peace of mind. Or anything like it.
D. So, what are we left with? If money, sex and power won’t satisfy, what will?
1. I think the answer must be that the satisfaction we seek—the peace of mind we crave, the sense of fulfillment we so desperately want—is quite simply not found in this world.
2. Nothing in this world satisfies the hunger within; the answer must come from outside the world.
3. Satisfaction comes from God—and from nowhere else.
4. That’s what Augustine was trying to say 1500 years ago when he wrote his famous prayer: “You have made us for yourself, and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in you.”
5. Pascal said something similar when he commented that there is a “God-shaped vacuum” or “hole” inside each man.
a. We may try to fill that vacuum with the things of this world—money, sex and power—but the result is spiritual indigestion. Our tummies are full but our hearts are empty.
6. Where can we go to find the things we want more than anything else in the world?
a. We can go to God, for in Him we find what we seek.
E. With that introduction, I want us to return to our sermon series from the book of Romans called “Paul’s Letter to the Romans: Pursuing Righteousness From God.”.
1. After spending several months in Romans, and getting all the way through chapter 4, we took a break for a few weeks from our series.
2. Now as we return to Romans chapter 5, Paul’s letter to the Romans takes a decisive turn.
3. Up to this point in the letter, Paul’s focus has been on the power of the gospel to put people who are locked up in sin and under sentence of God’s wrath into a right relationship with God.
4. Through the preaching of the good news, God invites all people – Jew and Gentile alike – to believe in Christ and enter into this new relationship of salvation by grace through faith.
5. Paul’s entire description of the gospel may be summed up in one word: Justification.
a. The word means “to declare righteous.”
b. It comes from the courtroom and pictures that moment when a verdict of “Not Guilty” is declared by the judge.
c. Robert Mounce offers this excellent summary of justification: “To be justified means to be acquitted, to gain a right standing. Justification frees the guilty man from paying the just penalty of his sin. It declares that he is totally exonerated. All charges are dropped.” (Themes From Romans, pp 43-44)
d. Justification is the act whereby God declares a sinner righteous, not guilty, the moment he or she expresses their faith and repentance by being baptized into Jesus.
6. This acquittal is absolutely free because it is based on the unmerited favor (grace) of God.
7. God arranged a plan by which He could justify the guilty and still remain a moral being, and then carried it out.
a. It’s a free offer - the only option we have is to accept it or reject it.
b. Justification means that God has done everything necessary for us to go to heaven.
c. His Son has paid the price for our sin.
d. Nothing you or I do, can add, in the least bit, to our salvation.
F. As Romans chapter 5 begins, Paul now turns his attention to what comes after one’s justification.
1. In chapters 5-8, Paul focuses on two matters in particular:
a. The first matter is our certainty that our justification will lead to final salvation.
b. The second matter is the new power God gives us in our continuing struggle against sin and the law.
2. The assurance of our salvation dominates the first section of chapter 5 and also the final section of chapter 8, kind of acting as bookends framing the arguments of this section.
3. Then in the middle chapters of 6 and 7, Paul deals with two continuing threats to our assurance: sin and the law.
G. Let’s focus our attention on the first five verses of Romans 5 and rejoice and marvel at the blessings that are ours because of our justification in Christ.
1. Romans 5:1-5, 1 Therefore, since we have been declared righteous by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. 2 We have also obtained access through him by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. 3 And not only that, but we also rejoice in our afflictions, because we know that affliction produces endurance, 4 endurance produces proven character, and proven character produces hope. 5 This hope will not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.
2. That justification by faith is the universal experience of all who put their faith in Jesus.
a. In Paul’s mind, there is no such thing as an “unjustified” Christian.
b. If you are not justified by faith in Christ, then you aren’t a Christian at all.
c. The only way to be right with God is to trust Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior.
d. Nothing else can gain us a right standing with God.
3. In these verses in Romans chapter 5, Paul reveals 3 great blessings that come to the believer as a result of our justification by faith.
I. The first great blessing from our justification is: We Have Peace With God through Jesus.
A. The word “peace” means to be in a state of well-being and prosperity because the war has ended.
1. Some of you may remember V-E Day or V-J Day at the end of World War II.
a. Many of us can remember the celebration at the end of the Persian Gulf war in 1991.
b. This peace means that the fighting is over, and the soldiers have put down their guns.
2. But more than that, peace means the restoration of a broken relationship.
a. It’s more than just the end of fighting and bickering.
b. It’s what happens when two people who haven’t been speaking once again become friends.
c. Peace is a positive change in a relationship between two people who once were enemies!
4. In the beginning, Adam and Eve lived in peace with God, but sin entered the relationship, and humans turned to their own devices, and the relationship with God was broken.
a. The Bible tells us that our sin causes every person to become an enemy of God.
5. But now, Paul says, through Jesus and as a result of our justification we have peace with God.
B. Please do not confuse peace “with God” with the peace “of God” – they are 2 different things.
1. The peace “of God” is that sense of moment-by-moment happiness which we may have as we trust our Heavenly Father in the midst of the problems of life.
2. But peace “with God” comes as a result of accepting Christ’s sacrifice for our salvation.
a. It means that God’s wrath is no longer hanging over us. Heaven and justice are satisfied.
b. We are no longer enemies of God, but through Christ, we have become his friends.
c. Both are vitally important, but peace “with God” comes before the peace “of God.”
3. Some people ask the question: “Have you made your peace with God?”
a. The Bible never uses that expression because it is impossible to “make peace with God.”
b. Humans can’t do that - you can’t “make peace” with the Almighty - it starts with God.
c. The Bible says that Jesus “made peace by the blood of his cross.” (Colossians 1:20)
d. If Jesus “made peace” when he died on the cross, then all that is left for us to do is to accept by faith the peace He has already made.
e. So, we don’t “make peace” with God; He “made peace” with us through Jesus’ crucifixion.
4. Peace with God is the first great blessing that comes to the Christian as a result of justification.
II. The second great blessing from our justification is: We Have Access to God and God’s grace.
A. Verse 2: We have also obtained access through him by faith into this grace in which we stand...
1. The word “access” means “to enter the presence of a king.”
a. It speaks of the right to enter the inner chambers and speak with the king face to face.
b. “Access” is a privilege given only to the king’s family and close friends, and associates.
c. Paul is saying that through Jesus Christ we may now enter the very presence of God.
2. Consider how revolutionary this truth is and was - especially for his Jewish readers.
a. They were accustomed to a system that kept a respectful distance between God and man.
b. The Gentiles were restricted to the outer court of the temple called the “Court of Gentiles.”
c. If a Gentile went beyond that court, he could be put to death.
d. Next was the “Court of the Women” for Jewish female worshipers.
e. Then next was the “Court of Israel” for Jewish men.
f. Next there was the “Court of the Priests where the altar of sacrifice was.
g. Finally, inside the temple proper, there was the “Holy Place” where only the priests could minister and behind it was the “Holy of Holies,” separated by a thick curtain.
h. Entrance into the “Holy of Holies” was restricted to the High Priest—and that only once a year on the Day of Atonement.
i. So, the message was clear: “Keep your distance!”
3. But here Paul is saying that all of us now have access to God.
a. How? “Through Him"—that is, through Jesus Christ.
b. Everything God has for us comes through Jesus Christ!
c. Jesus himself said, “No one comes to the Father except through me.” (John 14:6)
d. But when we come through Jesus Christ, we are admitted into the very presence of God himself - not the outer courts, not into some drab waiting room, but we are admitted into the throne room of heaven.
B. But also notice how that access is based on the “grace in which we stand.”
1. Our standing before God is based entirely on grace.
a. We stand in God’s presence as those who have a right to be there, not because of anything we have done, but because of His grace poured out on us.
b. We stand in grace—not on the basis of our works, but only on the merit of Jesus Christ.
c. Grace gives us hope that one day the gates of heaven will swing open for us.
d. As one writer put it, when you stand on grace, you’re not standing on slippery ground but on a solid rock! No ground is as solid as the grace of God.
2. Because of God’s love and grace, we have the right to enter God’s presence at any time.
a. As God’s children, we have the right to speak to God any time we want.
b. He’s our Father! We’re his children! He loves to hear from us.
c. Hebrews 4:16 speaks of “coming boldly to the throne of grace.”
e. The word “boldly” literally means “freedom of speech.”
f. God invites us to say whatever is on our mind.
g. John Newton the writer of Amazing Grace, wrote: Thou art coming to a King, Large petitions with thee bring. For his grace and power are such, None can ever ask too much.
3. Access to God is the second great benefit of justification by faith.
III. The third great blessing from our justification is: We Have the Hope of Glory.
A. Paul wrote: and we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God (Vs. 2).
1. The word “hope” can be misleading because in common usage the word hope means “maybe it will happen and maybe it won’t” “I hope the Dolphins will win the Super Bowl.”
a. But the biblical concept of hope is much different: It means “a confident expectation that something will happen because God has said it will happen.”
b. Biblical hope is not a “hope so,” but a “know so.”
2. The third benefit of justification, then, is the confident expectation of the “hope of glory.”
a. J.B. Phillips translates this as the “happy certainty” of the glory of God.
3. What is this glory?
a. It is that of which we all fall short (Romans 3:23).
b. It’s what Adam and Eve had in the Garden of Eden.
c. It’s the shining radiance of God’s presence.
d. It’s what we shall be like when we see Jesus face to face (1 John 3:2).
e. It’s what we were meant to be - it’s what we want more than anything else in the world.
f. “Glory” is also another word for paradise or heaven.
4. In short, the “hope of glory” is the confident expectation that one day God will fulfill all his promises to us.
a. The “hope of glory” is the assurance that when you die, you are going to heaven.
b. That’s simple enough, isn’t it? You either have that hope or you don’t.
c. But can anyone be sure of heaven? Can our heavenly hope be a “know so” hope?
d. We can be that sure if our faith is in God and His grace in which we stand.
e. In 1 John 5:13, John says: “I write these things that you might know that you have eternal life.”
f. How can we know? Because the verse before says: “Whoever has the son has life.”
g Do you have the “happy certainty” that heaven is your eventual destination?
B. But lest anyone think that the Christian life is only “pie in the sky by and by,” Paul quickly adds a surprising development: And not only that, but we also rejoice in our afflictions…(vs. 3)
1. The bright lights of the distant heavenly future cannot cancel the dark realities of the present.
a. What difference does knowing Christ make when my life is falling apart?
b. Does faith in Jesus Christ make a difference when…Your marriage is on the rocks? The cancer has come back? Your children are in trouble? The company lays you off? Your parents get a divorce? Your daughter decides to have an abortion?
c. When life tumbles in, what then? Does Jesus make a difference when the going is tough?
2. Listen to Paul’s answer: “We rejoice in our afflictions (or sufferings).”
a. What? Paul, have you lost your mind? Rejoice in sufferings? That’s absurd. No one rejoices in their problems. But that’s exactly what Paul says.
3. Paul doesn’t stop there, he adds: because we know that affliction produces endurance, endurance produces proven character, and proven character produces hope. This hope will not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us. (vs. 3-5)
4. The most important words of verse 3 are “we know.”
a. There are so many things we don’t know…We don’t know why cancer hits one person and not another. We don’t know why the brakes failed. We don’t know why the money didn’t come in. We don’t know why our child struggles and another excels. We don’t know why the tornado touched down in this town but not in that one. So many things we don’t know—in fact there is a far more that we don’t know.
b. But this we do know—“All things work together for good.” That’s Romans 8:28.
c. But how do they work together for good?
d. One part of the answer is Romans 5:3-4: The sufferings of life work together for good because they promote our spiritual growth.
e. That’s a radical thought - For most of us, trials are merely something to be endured.
f. We grit our teeth, we grin and bear it—if we grin at all.
g. Paul says no—we rejoice in the hard times because we know that God is working in the hard times to produce something beautiful in us.
5. The word suffering or affliction means “to press down.”
a. Suffering is that which presses down upon us. It happens to all of us. No one is exempt from difficulty. No one gets a free pass.
b. The message is simple: Suffering is the believer’s servant, not his master.
c. Not only do trials not overthrow or negate the blessings of God, they themselves lead into the blessings of God.
6. The hard times of life are sent or allowed by God in order to produce something good in us.
a. Listen closely: God is not in the business of making everything easy for you and me!
b. Believers are not exempt from life’s challenges – that’s the false hope of the peddlers of the health and wealth gospel – they teach that God wants you to be healthy and filthy rich.
c. Salvation is free, but the road to heaven is mostly uphill – thankfully we have God and each other to carry us along the way.
7. Please note. We don’t rejoice in the fact of our suffering - That would be odd and pathological. a. Suffering by definition is distasteful. Suffering causes pain and pain hurts!
b. But pain can also help – in weightlifting lingo – “No pain, No gain.”
c. So, we rejoice in what we gain by our suffering.
d. And what we gain in the end far out-weighs the pain we go through (2 Cor. 4:17 – Our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us a glory that far outweighs it all.)
e. The things God accomplishes through suffering cannot be accomplished any other way.
f. That’s the reason that we rejoice in suffering.
C. What can affliction produce?
1. Paul says that suffering produces endurance or perseverance – these are things that can’t be developed or demonstrated without having to do them.
2. Endurance then produces proven character – this word was sometimes used of silver that had been passed through the fire so that all the dross was removed.
a. The pure silver that was left was said to be the “real thing.” – proven.
b. Job 23:10 speaks to this point: “He knows the way that I take; when he has tried me, I shall come forth as gold.” (the pure stuff!)
c. Ray Stedman said: God is in the process of making veterans. He delights to take raw, untested rookies and put them in the crucible. When they come out, they aren’t raw or untested and they aren’t rookies anymore. They’re veterans, men and women of “proven character.”
3. The final result is “hope.”
a. As suffering does its work, we develop perseverance, then tested character, and finally hope—the confident expectation that we will not be disappointed.
b. What we discover in the darkness is that God is there to sustain us, and that gives us hope to keep on going.
4. And here’s the wonderful thing: As we cooperate with God, He completes his work in us, and we become kinder, gentler, more compassionate, less irritable, wiser, and more trustworthy.
a. We look back and say, “It wasn’t me who did it, but it was all God’s doing. God keeps His promises!” and we wouldn’t have seen it or known it without the trials of life.
b. The path is hard, but the end result is that we become better people—refined, purified, tested, and yes, strengthened by the things we have suffered.
c. Best of all, we discover that our sufferings have an eternal reward that far outweighs them all. “Hope does not disappoint” - not in this life or in the life to come.
d. Nothing is wasted in a believer’s life - our worst trials are down payments on something wonderful to come.
5. One more thing… This hope will not disappoint us, because God’s love has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.
a. Those who know Jesus experience of the love of God being poured into their hearts.
b. So many people make so many dumb choices because they are looking for love in all the wrong places.
c. There is only one place we can go to find perfect love, unconditional love, love that sees us as we really are and accepts us anyway – that kind of love comes from God.
6. One of the children’s songs we sing includes the verses: Peace like a river, joy like a fountain and love like an ocean.
a. The truth is: we find all that we need “In God” and “from God.”
b. So, if you want peace like a river, then turn to Jesus.
c. If you want joy like a fountain, then turn to Jesus.
d. If you want love like an ocean, then turn to Jesus.
e. The most sought after things in life are found in Him – peace, joy, and love.
f. Our greatest need is to know Jesus – to receive justification through Him, which results in peace with God, access to God and His grace, which leads to hope.
7. Let’s put our faith and trust in Jesus and experience all we need from Him.
Resources:
Romans: Be Right, The Bible Exposition Commentary, by Warren Wiersbe
Romans, The NIV Application Commentary, by Douglas Moo
Romans, Interpretation – A Bible Commentary for Teaching and Preaching, Paul Achtemeier
The Most Sought After Things in the World, Sermon by Ray Pritchard
